Official Zelda Timeline (Revision 10910)

The Legend of Zelda encyclopedia/art book, Hyrule Historia, features an "official timeline" for the series.

For decades, fans have wondered how the Zelda games fit together. Some seemed to obviously tie together, others seemed to contradict each other. Through all the speculation, Nintendo remained quiet, stating that it knew the timeline but had little interest in revealing those details. It appears as though the company has changed its mind, and this new book has the answers.

The Zelda series starts with a simple progression. The first four games in the timeline, from earliest to latest are:

1 The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

2 The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap

3 The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords

4 The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

Here's where things get complicated, because Ocarina deals with a leap in time and technically only spells out one of those timelines with its ending. However, if these reports are to be believed, Nintendo has generated three scenarios based on Ocarina of Time.

The first, which we'll call Timeline A, assumes Link actually fails to stop Ganon. How or why this is a logical storyline path is a bit lost on us, because the game resolves that battle, but regardless, here are the games that follow Timeline A:

5-A. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

6-A. The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons/Oracle of Ages

7-A. The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening

8-A. The Legend of Zelda

9-A. Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

So there's that - many games based on an odd presumption. Regardless, the next path, Timeline B, works from the presented ending of Ocarina of Time, featuring Link returning to live through his childhood. As we all know, Majora's Mask picks up shortly after Ocarina's ending, leading to these games:

5-B. The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask

6-B. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

7-B. The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures

One more timeline for you. This one starts with Ganon's defeat in the Ocarina of Time era, and progresses from there - from the time that Link advanced and eventually left so he could be a child once again. Here are the games in Timeline C: